ShareThisBy JOHN TUCKER
Thursday, November 09, 2006
It is painfully frustrating when you have to watch your team fall on hard times. Especially when it's a tradition-rich program with a longstanding history of success on the college gridiron... like Alabama, Notre Dame and Penn State.
Within the past five to six years, their players and fans suffered through some real bad times. Embarrassing losses. Losing seasons. No bowl games.
It's tough on everybody connected with a program that prides itself in a winning tradition.
It makes people say and do stupid, embarrassing and sometimes, downright shameful things ... like suggesting Bobby Bowden should retire at Florida State.
These so-called FSU boosters are bringing shame on their university, its football players and fans, by calling for the winningest coach in the history of Division I-A college football to step down.
Have they lost their senses? Certainly they've lost their sense of what's fair and right.
Did they learn nothing from the shortsightedness of those who, until last year, were proclaiming that the game had passed by legendary Penn State coach Joe Paterno?
Paterno isn't a quitter. Nor is Bowden. Neither is about to be pressured into retirement.
Shame on those who would even try, knowing these are great men, great coaches, and legends of the game. They've earned the right to step down on their terms.
Paterno's team went 11-1 last season and came within one play of possibly playing for the national championship. The Nittany Lions finished third in the final rankings. And Paterno was named The Associated Press college football Coach of the Year.
His critics, for the most part, have shut up. Finally exercising some common sense, they don't want to make fools of themselves again.
Those FSU boosters and fans that are calling for Bowden's ouster should take a lesson. Remember who got you to where you are.
When Bowden took over at Florida State in 1976, the program was in total disorder. He built it into the winningest program of the 1990s. His teams went 109-13-1 from 1990 through 1999 and won a pair of national titles (1993 and 1999) in the process.
Fans undoubtedly became spoiled, expecting 10-win seasons year in and year out. And that just doesn't happen these days.
Need to place blame? Put it where it belongs ... on parity.
Bowden's teams have been struggling of late, losing seven of their last 12 games. The Seminoles are 4-4 (2-4 in the ACC) and in last place of the Atlantic Division of the ACC.
So does that means it is time for Bowden to go?
Penn State fans endured four losing seasons in a five-year span before Paterno turned things around last season at age 79.
Amazing how many people knew it was time for Paterno to step down BEFORE that 11-1 season.
JoePa is in his 41st year as the head coach at Penn State. His 360 victories trail Bowden by three. Paterno turns 80 next month; Bowden turns 77 next Wednesday.
So you think you'll know when these two extraordinary deans of the game have outlived their usefulness as college football coaches?
When you do, just say so, and be prepared to feel as you should... like a gosh darn fool.
Only Bowden and Paterno will know. Only they should decide when the time is right.
And that, folks, is as it should be.
Heading into the stretch run of the season:
The biggest surprise is that three Big East teams - West Virginia, Louisville and Rutgers - were still unbeaten heading into Thursday night's showdown between No. 3 West Virginia and No 5 Louisville. Almost as surprising, Miami and Florida State are struggling and unranked, while Boston College, Wake Forest and Georgia Tech are frontrunners for the ACC title.
It's no surprise that Southern Cal finally lost a game; the chinks in the Trojans' armor have been exposed week in and week out. We just didn't figure 5-3 Oregon State to do it.
Notre Dame doesn't face any ranked opponents before their season-ending game at Southern Cal. Besides USC, the Irish face North Carolina, Army and Air Force, which are a combined 7-17. The 7-1 Irish have just one win over a ranked opponent, a 14-10 victory over No. 20 Georgia Tech in their season-opener.
Florida is ranked fourth in this week's BCS standings, despite being ranked seventh in the Harris and USA Today polls. Texas, on the other hand, is ranked fourth in the polls but is seventh in the BCS rankings.
If Florida wins out and there are no undefeated Big East teams at season's end, the Gators could end up playing the winner of the Ohio State-Michigan game for the national title. It's pretty much a done deal whoever wins that Nov. 18 battle in Columbus will play in the BCS championship game.
Auburn and Texas - No. 6 and 7 respectively in the BCS standings - are still in the running for a title shot, albeit from the outside. In addition to winning out, they need West Virginia, Florida and Louisville all to lose.
(Contact John Tucker at jtucker(at)unionleader.com)
